A nineteen-line poetic form consisting of five three-line stanzas (tercets) followed by a final, four-line stanza (quatrain). The first and third lines of the first stanza rhyme with each other and are repeated throughout the poem (although they can be varied a little): the first line of the first stanza is the last line of the second and fourth stanzas, and the third line of the first stanza is the last line of the third and fifth stanzas. The two lines then form the last couplet of the final stanza. The first and last lines of all the stanza rhyme with each other, and the second lines of all stanzas also rhyme with each other. However hard anyone tries to make it sound simple, it is always a lot clearer to understand what a villanelle is by looking at one rather than looking at a description of what one is!
Submitted by Janine on
The courts prejudge and penalise,
applying law, not playing fair,
convicting of 'joint enterprise'
Two words that catch and criminalise
the skin you're in, the clothes you wear,
they prejudge and they penalise
You're guilty in the system's eyes
and though they know you were elsewhere
convict you of 'joint enterprise'
Submitted by Janine on
Accept our rule and stop this hue and cry
Some loved ones have to go before their time
It's just the weak and sick and old who'll die
We have a theory here to justify
Our nudging unit thinks it's just sublime
Accept our rule and stop this hue and cry
No need to test or rest or notify
Our British stock is mostly in its prime
It's just the weak and sick and old who'll die
Submitted by Janine on
A villanelle about the deaths of workers at the Crossrail Bond Street site.
Don't go down to level five
A killer's prowling in the deep
Stay away and stay alive
Worker bees construct a hive
of industry, where toxins seep
Don't go down to level five
Submitted by Janine on
Work hard, be conscientious, be afraid
Your life won't be worth living if you fail
The only thing that matters is your grade
Feel guilty for each error you have made
Learn quotes by rote and don't stop to exhale
Work hard, be conscientious, be afraid
Of falling short of A-star accolade
Don't eat, don't sleep, travail your skin to pale
The only thing that matters is your grade
Submitted by Janine on
The Pfizer guys are haggling with the NICE
And while they talk, the cancer spreads again
You’ll get your pills when they’ve agreed a price
You’ll get your answer when they’ve rolled their dice
And dealt your hand out in their counting den
The Pfizer guys are haggling with the NICE
Submitted by Janine on
The warming of oceans by greenhouse gases emitted by human activity has caused large-scale death of coral reefs. A hat tip to Dylan Thomas' 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Dark Night', as I nicked his villanelle refrain.
Do not concede the gentle coral's grief
Attend the lessons nature has to teach
Rage, rage against the dying of the reef
Great oceans flow too warm and not too brief
So polyps spit out algae, turn to bleach
And gentle corals fade to death-white grief
Submitted by Janine on
A villanelle about the Aberfan coal mining disaster, in which 144 people, including 116 school children, died when a coal mining waste tip collapsed. There was a lot of anger at the National Coal Board for its neglect of safety, and at the inquest, one father insisted, "I want it recorded – "Buried alive by the National Coal Board." That is what I want to see on the record. That is the feeling of those present. Those are the words we want to go on the certificate."
The miner insisted the coroner record
The Pantglas School building a homicide scene
They were buried alive by the National Coal Board
Submitted by Janine on
We are not heroes, not the valiant sort
We let them take us, fell in to survive
The heroes are the ones who stood and fought
Our bodies packed together frail support
The nudging of her foot kept me alive
But we're not heroes, not the valiant sort
Our best fought underground, our martyrs caught
Resistance from the shadows, fire and strive
The heroes are the ones who stayed and fought
Submitted by Janine on
The life expectancy of a Black trans woman in the USA is just 35. This is a villanelle about that shocking statistic.
Black boys grown women fighting to survive
In freedom's land are some folks not allowed
To live beyond the age of thirty-five?
Dysphoria and prejudice connive
From gender manacles to funeral shroud
Black boys grown women fighting to survive
Submitted by Janine on
For those with powerful poignant tale to tell
Outsiders seeking structure so sublime
A strong expressive form is villanelle
Its lines repeat like sounding of a bell
Each tercet ends with alternating chime
For those with powerful poignant tale to tell
It saves us from unstructured rhymeless hell
So modernists disdain its fixed-form crime
So villainous a form is villanelle
